Professor and two students write bulletin on the value of AI in NC Benchmarking project research

The North Carolina Benchmarking Project was established in 1995 to help municipalities compare their service and performance trends with other participating units. Each year, throughout August and September, partner municipalities submit performance and management data across eleven services to the University of North Carolina’s School of Government. The Benchmarking Project audits and uploads that data on a dashboard and invites participants to eleven performance strategy sessions in November to analyze data and discuss shared challenges and practices likely to resolve those challenges. The information from the strategy sessions and the dashboard is synthesized into annual reports.

Last year, the Benchmarking Project leveraged AI to manage report-development and data-auditing processes. The use of AI in these two tasks significantly reduced the hours spent on them, decreased the error rate, and strengthened the outcomes. This bulletin describes how the Benchmarking Project team adopted AI for that data auditing and report development. The team hopes that its experience will serve as an example for others thinking about leveraging AI to improve their processes.

Keegan Huynh, a special projects coordinator for the North Carolina Association of County Commissioners, and Christopher L. Cole II, a project coordinator for the North Carolina Benchmarking Project, co-authored this bulletin.

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